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Water is essential to human health and sleep. Dehydration can cause sleep disturbances and sleep disturbances can increase your risk of being dehydrated. At the same time, too much fluid intake can cause excess urination that may lead to sleep interruptions. Symptoms of dehydration can cause fatigue, headaches, dry mouth and muscle cramps.
If you frequently find yourself thirsty at night, it might mean that you aren’t staying hydrated during the day. Depending on your height and weight, you could need more water than the average amount. The problem often isn’t that you don’t understand that you need more water but trying to find time and circumstances to get your daily recommended amount. Here are some different ways to ensure you get plenty of water every day.
Drink Water When You Wake Up
Everyone should have a healthy wake up routine where they wake up, stretch, brush their teeth, eat breakfast and so forth. Adding the step of drinking a glass of water right when you wake up is a healthy habit to engage in. This is good for your body because it will get your bodily functions moving right away, so that you can have proper elimination during the day and provide fresh fluids for your vital organs. Your mind will also function more efficiently, because you’re giving it something vital to promote proper cellular functionality.
Get a Water Bottle or a Dedicated Cup
It’s all about the cup! If you keep a water bottle around, you will find it easier to remember to drink water, and you will be far less likely to reach for a high calorie sugary drink. Another great advantage of having a water bottle is that it will help you to be more aware of the amount of water that you drink in a day. Some people will even go as far as buying a water bottle that visibly measures how much water they’ve drank.
Sip Water Throughout the Day
By maintaining hydration throughout the day, you have less to worry about when bedtime rolls around. Sipping water, vs. guzzling it will allow your tissues to absorb the water vs. flushing through your kidneys quickly. This is where having a dedicated cup comes in handy. A fun and happy cup makes it easily accessible and easier to track how much water you have consumed.
Make and Drink Fruit Infused Water
A common problem people have with drinking water isn’t that they don’t remember to drink it, but they’re just not interested in it or that they find it bland. You don’t necessarily have to drink just plain filtered or tap water. You can be creative and add flavour! Infusing water with the essence of fruits, herbs, and other botanicals helps you drink plenty of liquids without the downside of excess calories, sugars, and artificial flavorings.
The Simple Method
The quickest and cheapest way to add flavor to your water, is to add lemon to your water. All you need to do is add a few lemon wedges into your water, squeezing in the juice first, then putting the wedges in it. Lemons have a lot of tart juice, so this will flavor your water quickly and easily. Lemon water is also good for detoxifying your liver. You can also try a mixture of lemon and lime or grapefruit.
Fruit or Vegetable Infused Water
You can use other fruits, vegetables, and even herbs to flavor your water. Let the water sit overnight. When doing this, you are adding more nutrients from the produce and herbs while flavouring your water.
Make the water in a glass pitcher vs. a plastic container so the plastic doesn't absorb the oils of the fruits and smell of the vegetables or herbs. Prepare your fruits, veggies, and herbs depending on what they are. Berries should be sliced so you can access the juice inside. Fruits with hard skin like watermelon, should be peeled first. Veggies should also be peeled and chopped.
Add the ingredients to the bottom of the pitcher, cover with ice, then add your water. Let it sit in the refrigerator for as long as you can before drinking it, which really allows those flavors and nutrients to come through.
Hydrate Before Bed
During sleep, it is inevitable that you will lose small amounts of water. When you go 7 – 8 hours without any sort of fluids, your mind and body can become somewhat dehydrated. While you won’t want to consume a large quantity of water right before going to sleep, it could be a very good thing if you were to drink a smaller cup of water about 30 minutes before going to bed.
Focus on Good Sleep Habits
You can adopt habits that encourage better sleep. Getting a sufficient amount of high-quality sleep is an important part of preventing dehydration. While you sleep, your body loses water as you sweat and breathe. If your bedroom temperature is too warm, you may sweat more. Keep your sleep environment between 15-23 degrees Celsius for optimal for sleep.
Your sleep cycles are closely related to your nutrition and metabolism. Together, exercise, diet and sleep create a foundation for long term well-being. A sleep promoting diet, consists of limiting your refined sugar intake and eating clean whole foods.
Learning to regulate your nervous system & emotions with effective stress management practices and evidence-based neuroscience tools to balance your mind, body and integrated brain is also essential to reducing stress and improving your quality and quantity of sleep.
Download Your Road Map to Better Sleep with the How-to-Steps to Jumpstart your nervous system for better sleep and 10 Steps To Creating a Healthy Bedtime Routine.
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